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Tag Archives: Healthy living

How has your week been? Good or bad? Mine has gone well…I will get this over with my first sourdough loaf is cooked, eaten and was divine…I was so chuffed at the lovely comments I received…Of course, I had to sample it in the name of quality control and with proper butter as well…haha…

The rest of the week has been just normal healthy eating and walking which has increased due to 2 factors one is that our granddaughter is staying with us for 8 weeks( school ) holiday and two my smartwatch is keeping tabs on my steps…The daily recommended guidelines are 10,000 steps which sounds a lot but doable…

As you know I advocate eating healthy balanced meals I don’t believe in cutting out food groups like meat, most fruits or pasta/rice/potatoes…I do believe we should avoid or eat little highly processed foods, food with added sugars, we should choose good quality cooking oils, avoid excessive intake of high mercury fish like tuna…Alcohol enjoy just not in excess.

For me, that is easy to follow and coupled with the 16/8 intermittent fasting and exercise I am seeing results.

That hasn’t always been the case...At this moment I am the lightest I have been for a good few years …I have also accepted I will never be the weight I was when I married… More fat on a chip my husband used to say…haha

Life happened, I got married, I had kids… I ate what they didn’t, I worked and shopped in my lunch hour and while queuing to pay eyed the strategically placed sweets by the till ( those stores) know how to tempt one don’t they? The mums and friends who mean well…Just have one…That won’t hurt…

I feel your pain I know what you have been through or going through so does my friend Sally…Who is a Certified Nutritionist and knows the pitfalls and curve balls life throws at us …Both of us have struggled with weight at times during our lives …

It ain’t easy and while I may make it appear to be …I have eaten my share of what I shouldn’t and moderation did not come into it…I am now older and wiser…haha…Believe what you will…But I have realised I need to cherish this body as it is the one and only one I have or will have…Better late than never…

How to manage people…The well-meaning ones of course…

And remember…Losing weight is not a sprint, it is a marathon and your mental and emotional attitude towards the project is a key factor in your successful weight loss.

Sally’s posts are both informative with a little humour and she will tell you it is not easy she knows but I will let her tell you her story…

Diets come and go...Faddy things aren’t they? Mostly a flash in the pan and not sustainable…A new one has arisen…A hybrid of the Paleo diet and the Vegan diet…All the good bits…The Pegan Diet…

I know it just had to happen, didn’t it?

The basics of the Pegan Diet…3/4 vegetables and 1/4 meat/fish @ each meal, the meat/fish from good quality sources…( no hormones and antibiotics)…It focuses on eating more fibre and low glycemic index fruits, eliminating sugar, dairy unless it comes from ( goat/sheep) products eating little or no highly processed foods thus avoiding foods produced using chemicals and pesticides…eliminating legumes except for lentils…

Great in theory and first glance and sounds similar to what I believe in however it is quite restrictive and would need some planning and the bottom line is we need a Healthy Balanced Diet…No eliminating essential foods… It seems to me that the people who market and promote all these diets think they have to come up with something new all of the time and I suppose celebrity endorsements don’t help that trend…

Frankly just because a celebrity endorses a product doesn’t mean it works…No one size fits all, no one’s lifestyle is the same as Fred’s next door we are all individuals with different needs, Stress levels, family commitments, work commitments so much factors into the equation…

Healthy Eating is a lifestyle choice and takes time to adjust…You will have blips or bad days/weeks but it is how you deal with it…

We just need to eat sensible, normal healthy foods and a balanced diet…Most of the time.

♦♦♦♦♦

Smartwatch Corner.

I am still impressed with my new toy…I will say it keeps me focused…

So far I use the step counter…It does have other functions like running and workouts but I enjoy walking …The recommended daily steps are 10,000 which is doable…..Last Thursday I achieved 14,000 plus steps in one day…I was out and about doing kids things and shopping so although tired it was a revelation as to how many steps I did do that day…An average day for me is 6-7000 I am working on getting to 10,000 more often…

The other function I love is the sleep function...

It shows 3 levels, Deep sleep, light sleep and Rem sleep plus gives you the normal range and tells you where you are in that either normal, high or low. Plus it gives your overall hours of sleep, how many times you woke up with an explanation of your total hours of sleep and how long you were in the stages and what happens to your body while you are in each stage of sleep…

It also offers an explanation as to what causes any changes and how you can remedy it with links to other sites for further info.

I am finding this really interesting as I am gradually seeing a pattern forming and am realising which factors are influencing my sleep for example what I am doing prior to sleep or what I have been drinking as I don’t eat after 8pm.

It also tells me my heart rate …An explanation can also be found on heart rates.

What I do find amusing is the little green man who buzzes and waves at me when I have been inactive for a while…

It also has other functions which I don’t use yet or may not as I purchased this mainly to keep a little eye on my health. Which while it may not be exactly spot on but accurate as these can be but as the watch is on your pulse give or take a few beats it is accurate enough for me…

Thank you for reading and please tell me in comments your thoughts if you have a smartwatch…x

About Carol Taylor:

Enjoying life in The Land Of Smiles I am having so much fun researching, finding new, authentic recipes both Thai and International to share with you. New recipes gleaned from those who I have met on my travels or are just passing through and stopped for a while. I hope you enjoy them.

I love shopping at the local markets, finding fresh, natural ingredients, new strange fruits and vegetable ones I have never seen or cooked with. I am generally the only European person and attract much attention and I love to try what I am offered and when I smile and say Aroy or Saab as it is here in the north I am met with much smiling.

Some of my recipes may not be in line with traditional ingredients and methods of cooking but are recipes I know and have become to love and maybe if you dare to try you will too. You will always get more than just a recipe from me as I love to research and find out what other properties the ingredients I use contain to improve our health and wellbeing.

The environment is also something I am passionate about and there will be more on this on my blog this year

Exciting for me hence the title of my blog, Retired No One Told Me! I am having a wonderful ride and don’t want to get off, so if you wish to follow me on my adventures, then welcome! I hope you enjoy the ride also and if it encourages you to take a step into the unknown or untried, you know you want to…….Then, I will be happy!

More and more of my blogging friends have joined me on MeWe…A social media site which is fairly new and which promises much without the restrictions some other social media sites are choosing to impose on many of us…Join me if you will onmewe.com/i/caroltaylor3

Welcome to Tuesdays Healthy eating post…It seems like last weeks post on Intermittent fasting is something many of you are following or thinking about it certainly seems to be the way forward and is on many health professionals radar…

Healthy eating is not about deprivation but about choosing foods for the well-being of the one body we have been given…I believe as do many that we need a healthy balanced diet and the occasional treat is fine and to be enjoyed…

When I stated what I had cut out last week it was foods I believed were having a negative impact on MY body…It is foods which have empty calories, do not add anything healthy to MY diet…That’s it!

You are in charge of yours and nothing wrong with having a drink of alcohol or a biscuit or two if you fancy it… for me altogether they were having a negative impact …

Enough of that…I have attached this little chart of Sally’s for you to check out if you want…No pressure here…just conversations as to what works for us as individuals no one size fits all…

This little table certainly focused my mind… As did Sally’s and my recent post… together we are aiming to help you reach your goals…There are some great ideas to help you with your healthy eating and some straight talking from Sally…I just provide the recipes…

Nothing worthwhile in life is easy…Think about writing a novel….That bit is easy but what comes after …editing and rewrites etc BUT we do it…Healthy eating and or weight loss is just the same so… Let’s go and do it!

Stuck for recipes? Need some inspiration?…

In this series, we look at cooking and your diet from a different perspective. Usually, we emphasize the health benefits of food and how they can be incorporated into your diet. But, what happens if you do NOT include them in your diet.

We wanted to share with you what happens if your body is deprived of individual nutrients over an extended period of time.

I have a smartwatch….Yeah…It is smarter than me…Honestly not something I would ever have envisaged buying…Why? I am really not a gadgets person…Or one who has to have the latest phone person either…However when I could not have the apps I wanted on my phone because Samsung loaded all their bloatware and by the time they had done that it left me very little to play with and I ended up having to uninstall an app to add another app and my needs are small…I don’t play games, pay with my phone or any shopping channels not of my choosing…

This made me have a rethink and consequently, I bought another phone which allowed me to install the few apps I do have …It also had a pre-installed fitness app which one’s grandson alerted me too…Thank you, Aston x

It also focussed my mind…Told me how many steps I have taken in a day…Also, lots of other stuff if I wanted…I found I did…

Hence some research into smart watches …So starting next week there will be a smartwatch corner as I discover new things about it…That saying about there is life in the old dog yet is coming true…Haha

The lovely girl in the shop set it up and synced( get me) it to my phone…It has just waved at me and shown an image of someone getting up and walking…Please, I am writing…haha…

But joking aside it is showing me the error of my ways..She who tries but is not perfect..is listening oh hallowed smartwatch… just don’t get too smart…

It has however piqued my interest about my sleep pattern for example…I was normal on all counts the first night..It also explained every step with links …I was impressed as I like to know that statements on health are backed up by research…

Then life in the form of my grandsons birthday cake stepped in…I had two pieces and enjoyed them (I also) knew I should have stuck at one…The second was I am loving my Green tea but not a good idea to have a late night pot of the said green tea( caffeine)…My smartwatch had a hissy fit yesterday morning reflected in my sleep pattern stats…

It bloody knew…Haha

Once I had digested those stats and I didn’t like them one lickle bit but I also knew what caused the blip…This morning I woke up bright and bushy-tailed unlike yesterday and my sleep pattern was much better so hopefully, tomorrows will be back to absolute normal …Smartwatch it is… I am impressed (so far)

I am also impressed by how our bodies react…A wonderful piece of machinery which we can abuse and abuse and then we can much of the time apply a little moderation and TLC and it purrs like a well-tuned car…Mine will never be a Rolls Royce but maybe, just maybe a little Honda Jazz…

Until next week…xxxx

Thank you for reading and please tell me in comments your thoughts if you have a smartwatch…x

About Carol Taylor:

Enjoying life in The Land Of Smiles I am having so much fun researching, finding new, authentic recipes both Thai and International to share with you. New recipes gleaned from those who I have met on my travels or are just passing through and stopped for a while. I hope you enjoy them.

I love shopping at the local markets, finding fresh, natural ingredients, new strange fruits and vegetable ones I have never seen or cooked with. I am generally the only European person and attract much attention and I love to try what I am offered and when I smile and say Aroy or Saab as it is here in the north I am met with much smiling.

Some of my recipes may not be in line with traditional ingredients and methods of cooking but are recipes I know and have become to love and maybe if you dare to try you will too. You will always get more than just a recipe from me as I love to research and find out what other properties the ingredients I use contain to improve our health and wellbeing.

The environment is also something I am passionate about and there will be more on this on my blog this year

Exciting for me hence the title of my blog, Retired No One Told Me! I am having a wonderful ride and don’t want to get off, so if you wish to follow me on my adventures, then welcome! I hope you enjoy the ride also and if it encourages you to take a step into the unknown or untried, you know you want to…….Then, I will be happy!

More and more of my blogging friends have joined me on MeWe…A social media site which is fairly new and which promises much without the restrictions some other social media sites are choosing to impose on many of us…Join me if you will onmewe.com/i/caroltaylor3

A good in-depth look at SUGAR…Yes and like a bad friend it wreaks havoc on our health…In this post-Sally give s a great in-depth look at how it is sneaked into our diets and what it does…A must read if your health is important to you 🙂 x

This week the first part of eliminating the overgrowth and creating a balanced bacteria in your gut by eliminating sugars

There is a ton of dietary advice out there on the net about the “correct” diet to get rid of an overgrowth of Candida, some of which is pretty drastic. Of course, you need to adjust your intake of certain foods, because even if you are prescribed anti-fungal drugs, the pathogen itself will always be present in your gut waiting for another opportunity to take over the body again.

Remember that Candida Albicans exists in all of us at normal levels in the intestines and it can just take a two day stomach upset, which causes an imbalance of healthy flora, to…

Good morning…We have had some much-needed rain my curry plant which I moved is now sprouting I have stopped watering that as ( hubby) was overzealous and it didn’t like it. My sourdough is looking good…Fingers crossed dogged persistence seems to be paying off…I am nothing if not stubborn…haha…I give myself the same talk every day…

Who do you cheat??? Yourself!

The fibre in our diets was the topic last week and it raised some interesting questions…

I am sure you are right about our fibre intake being too low, Carol. Wild rice is nice but it takes a long time to cook.

Yes, it does …However…I know wild rice takes longer to cook however to cut down on the cooking time for brown or wild rice, soak it overnight. For brown rice, the water-to-rice ratio is 2 to 1. For wild rice, cover with a generous amount of water, several inches above the rice. Soak the rice in a covered pot and keep in the refrigerator about six hours or overnight. It works a treat and even hubby ate some yesterday and that was a first he is getting quite adventurous in his old age…

I always use wholemeal flour for baking and brown basmati rice – I love the smell when it’s cooking. But I encounter great opposition when I try to sneak in wholemeal pasta! However, Cyberspouse does make a great vegetarian bolognaise with mushrooms, a can of five beans, peppers, courgettes and of course tomato, onion and garlic.

Janet has the same problem I have always encountered and we have to be sneaky…haha…Isn’t it funny how families can be opposed to some changes try making your own using half and half whole wheat flour to start and colouring with a vegetable colour…My grandkids love the coloured pasta. Cyberspouse’s spag bol sounds nice I love mixed beans.

But if they are getting adequate fibre from your baking and rice depending on how much pasta they are consuming in a week does it matter?… I would do sneaky, sneaky, slowly, slowly…haha Or get them to help make pasta it is known fact that what you help cook you are more likely to eat/try…Good Luck 🙂 x

There were also comments about how increasing fibre in the diet had helped with medical conditions and how doctors are recommending that we increase our fibre which is lovely to hear please keep those comments and experiences coming everyone loves to hear what works and if something doesn’t for you …Did you try an alternative that did? no one size fits all we need to experiment and find what we like to eat and what improves our health.

My alcohol-free February is going well day 14 TODAY and I feel great…Tummy is a little flatter I have increased my fibre and am cutting out those added sugar items eating lots of lovely fruit…my new favourite smoothie is tomatoes and passionfruit just whizz them together with some crushed ice ..very nice …I love passionfruit and there are lots at the moment so a lovely way to use them…

I know sometimes if you are trying to lose some pounds, eat healthily and we get those urges to just eat. It does seem that sometimes we try so very hard and are met with problems around every corner sometimes it is not us…There is a real reason and there may be something we can do … Sally’s posts are great, informative, sensible advice …Factual and common sense… Sally said…

I explored the physical events in my life from childhood that might have resulted in the inability to sustain a healthy weight. Whilst I could pinpoint a hormonal imbalance from puberty, and a cycle of crash dieting as contributors to my eventual morbid obesity. It was the more important discovery of a series of extended courses of antibiotics at age 10, that was to result in a breakthrough.

It is not just my health that was compromised, many millions of the population, particularly in developed countries also have been put at risk, with an estimated 70% of us with a candida albicans overgrowth, seriously undermining our health.

What is Candida Albicans

Candida is a fungal infection of the intestine. There is a delicate balance of bacteria in our gut and it works very much like a waste-disposal unit. However, certain conditions can activate…

Of course, I cannot go without leaving you with an easy and healthy recipe…

Thai food is a great choice for gluten-free and dairy-freeeaters because it is rice-based and uses a lot of coconut milk. … Traditional Thai soy sauce is gluten-free, but just be careful when eating out as restaurants may use wheat-basedChinese soy sauce.

Thai food is low on carbs, includes lots of fresh vegetables and herbs and most dishes are cooked very quickly so everything retains its colour and flavour, in fact, preparation most times takes longer than the actual cooking.

This Larb recipe can be made using chicken or Pork. I have used Pork Mince for this.

Larb Moo.

Ingredients: Serves 1-2 people.

200 gm Pork or chicken mince.

3 shallots finely sliced.

2 spring onions finely sliced green tops as well.

A handful of fresh Mint, pick the leaves from stem and tear the leaves into large pieces( mine is a big handful) I love mint.

A handful of fresh coriander chopped.

A few Thai Basil leaves for the decoration.

I Lime use half to a whole lime juice depending on personal taste.

Dried chillies..dry roasted in a pan and grind in pestle and mortar.

1 large tbsp toasted rice. ( recipe below)

1-2 tbsp Fish Sauce.

A small amount of palm sugar….I use it sparingly or not at all.

Lets Cook!

Using a small saucepan dry cook the mince, I add a small amount of water to stop it from sticking.

Stir until cooked, remove the pan from the heat.

Stir in toasted rice, sm amount palm sugar, chilli( as desired) start with 1 tsp and once all ingredients added ..taste and add more if required.

Stir in the mint and coriander, shallots and spring onions, stir well but carefully.

Add fish sauce and half of the lime juice.

Taste! if required add more chilli, fish sauce and or lime juice and Taste again as lime and chilli. Put in a serving dish.

Garnish with Thai Basil leaves.

Serve with steamed organic brown or wild rice /Thai sticky rice or if you don’t want to eat rice it is lovely served in lettuce cups.

Thai’s eat a lot of raw vegetables with Larb which is why it’s a fairly healthy meal and if a chicken is used it has even fewer calories.

It is an ideal dish if you are watching the calories as are many Thai dishes.

NB: To make the dried rice mix, Take a thick bottomed pan and put it on a medium to low heat, cover bottom with uncooked sticky rice( if you don’t have any) normal rice will do. Stir until rice turns a golden brown colour, tip into pestle and pound until powdery but slightly coarse.

N.B. Glutinous rice is gluten-free. The misleading name simply comes from the fact that glutinous rice gets glue-like and sticky when cooked. … It all comes down to starch content.

You can store the rice in a small container and it will keep for 6-8 weeks…

I hope you enjoy this dish as much as I do…I love this salad.

Having lived here 7 years and just discovering that this salad mix can also be shaped into little patties fried in a little oil and you have those lovely little Thai cakes they serve as a snack… Wrapped in a cabbage leaf and a squeeze of lime juice they are very tasty… You live and learn ..Don’t you?

That’s all from me for this week I hope you have enjoyed this post…How is your healthy eating going ???

Thank you for reading this post I am happy that you joined me today for our little chat on how we can improve the health of both our body and our purse/wallet.

I hope you thought so too xxx

About Carol Taylor:

Enjoying life in The Land Of Smiles I am having so much fun researching, finding new, authentic recipes both Thai and International to share with you. New recipes gleaned from those who I have met on my travels or are just passing through and stopped for a while. I hope you enjoy them.

I love shopping at the local markets, finding fresh, natural ingredients, new strange fruits and vegetable ones I have never seen or cooked with. I am generally the only European person and attract much attention and I love to try what I am offered and when I smile and say Aroy or Saab as it is here in the north I am met with much smiling.

Some of my recipes may not be in line with traditional ingredients and methods of cooking but are recipes I know and have become to love and maybe if you dare to try you will too. You will always get more than just a recipe from me as I love to research and find out what other properties the ingredients I use contain to improve our health and wellbeing.

The environment is also something I am passionate about and there will be more on this on my blog this year

Exciting for me hence the title of my blog, Retired No One Told Me! I am having a wonderful ride and don’t want to get off, so if you wish to follow me on my adventures, then welcome! I hope you enjoy the ride also and if it encourages you to take a step into the unknown or untried, you know you want to…….Then, I will be happy!

We all hope that we won’t have to have surgery …But you never know…If it is a scheduled surgery you have time to take Sally’s advice and get yourselves as prepared as possible which obviously aids recovery times.

If it is emergency surgery that is different so maybe it is a good idea to take Sally’s advice and just aim for a healthier body which will make you feel better and your body will be prepared at all times.

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Good morning I hope you had a good week last week… mine was ok…Although I have given myself a good kick up the proverbial just about an hour ago…Butt kicking it is called…haha…

Last week I covered Anti-inflammatory foods and Added Sugars ...When you break it down it does all point to healthy eating…Not boring and bland…Delicious healthy food with a moderate amount of excise thrown in…

What makes us reach for the biscuit tin or the chocolate bar??

Stress...Comes in all forms from the kid’s untidy bedrooms to an ever-demanding boss…I could write a long list but it comes in so many guises.

What we need is not Ghostbusters but Stress Busters.

Although if you watched a few episodes back to back it would probably de-stress you…haha…

Seriously though Sally published an article on stress which is well worth a read she covers everything much of it based on her own weight loss experiences her weight loss is impressive there are no holds barred she is brutally honest about herself.

Of course, a healthy diet sometimes needs to be based on your bodies requirements for example if you have a particular medical condition or diagnosed allergy so I will try to give you meals and recipes but also highlight the benefits of certain ingredients I find it helps if you know what you need to eat for optimum health after all we only have one body…

Also over at Sally’s, she is starting a new series soon for which I am providing recipes which will be highlighting vitamins and minerals also the foods which contain them. I think it is a brilliant idea and will help us all eat for optimum health which is my aim …How about you…??

Now that dreaded word exercise…This girl is brilliant…

Time for some recipes…This one is super easy and so tasty and for those of you like me who are experiencing beautiful weather or just because you want a nice healthy snack…Papaya Salsa… Called the fruit of the Angels by Christopher Columbus it is packed with Vitamin A & C and rich in sources of antioxidants especially carotenes so married with the tomato and lime Juice it is a healthy little bowl of salsa.

All you need is papaya, tomato, onions and coriander and some freshly squeezed lime juice…You can make enough for one or enough for a party…Just mix it all up together and enjoy!

If you are experiencing ultra cold weather then, of course, you want something nice and warming…

Today I am giving you one of my favourite dishes Asparagus is very plentiful here and one of my favourite stir fries with prawns, lemongrass and lime leaves. It is also a good source of Vitamin C.

Very quick and easy to do once you get your ingredients together.

Prawn and Asparagus Stir Fry.

Ingredients:

250 gm asparagus cut in half…asparagus is very thin here but if you are using thicker asparagus then either shave the asparagus or cut into 3-inch pieces.

A small piece of ginger peeled and grated.

1 stalk of lemongrass bashed and very finely chopped.

4 lime leaves very thinly sliced

3-4 tbsp of fish sauce

1 tbsp palm sugar or light muscovado sugar

1 tbsp coconut oil

10 raw king prawns either peeled or leave the tails on.

1 shallot thinly sliced

1-2 Thai birds eye chillies finely sliced

2-3 cloves of garlic finely chopped

4 spring onions cut into 2-inch pieces

Lets Cook!

Mix together the ginger, lemongrass, lime leaves, fish sauce and sugar and put to one side.

Meanwhile, heat the wok on high and when it’s really hot add the oil. Once the oil is shimmering, add in the king prawns and stir-fry for one to two minutes, until the prawns have gone pink with slightly golden edges. Remove with a slotted spoon.

Add the onion to the wok and stir-fry for two minutes. Add the chilli, garlic and spring onion and stir-fry for a further four minutes until the onions have softened. Add the asparagus and stir-fry for a further minute.

Finally, add the prawns, pour over the sauce which was prepared earlier, and cook until the sauce becomes sticky (around three minutes).

Serve immediately with Thai steamed rice and enjoy!

Day 5 of my sourdough starter …Take 2…So far so good…Just saying!

Anti- Ageing Food Corner:

Green Tea…My first drink of the day is a pot of green tea…What is Green Tea?

.

Green tea is produced from unoxidized leaves which means it goes through fewer processes thus it has more antioxidants and polyphenols than it’s sister black tea.

Green Tea has been used for many thousands of years in traditional Chinese and Indian medicines.

The amount of research into the medicinal properties of green tea is mind-blowing and very interesting in this case I am looking at the anti ageing properties.

Green tea is about 30 per cent polyphenols by weight, including large amounts of catechin called EGCG. Catechins are natural antioxidants that help prevent cell damage and provide other benefits.

These substances can reduce the formation of free radicals in the body, protecting cells and molecules from damage. These free radicals are known to play a role in ageing and all sorts of diseases.

Not only can green tea improve brain function in the short term, but it may also protect your brain in old age.

Thank you for reading this post I am happy that you joined me today.

For delicious healthy recipes, hints and tips on exercise and stress-busting.

I hope you thought so too xxx

About Carol Taylor:

Enjoying life in The Land Of Smiles I am having so much fun researching, finding new, authentic recipes both Thai and International to share with you. New recipes gleaned from those who I have met on my travels or are just passing through and stopped for a while. I hope you enjoy them.

I love shopping at the local markets, finding fresh, natural ingredients, new strange fruits and vegetable ones I have never seen or cooked with. I am generally the only European person and attract much attention and I love to try what I am offered and when I smile and say Aroy or Saab as it is here in the north I am met with much smiling.

Some of my recipes may not be in line with traditional ingredients and methods of cooking but are recipes I know and have become to love and maybe if you dare to try you will too. You will always get more than just a recipe from me as I love to research and find out what other properties the ingredients I use contain to improve our health and wellbeing.

The environment is also something I am passionate about and there will be more on this on my blog this year

Exciting for me hence the title of my blog, Retired No One Told Me! I am having a wonderful ride and don’t want to get off, so if you wish to follow me on my adventures, then welcome! I hope you enjoy the ride also and if it encourages you to take a step into the unknown or untried, you know you want to…….Then, I will be happy!

I hope you all had a brilliant festive season and that the New Year will be kind to you… I really feel that these posts seem to be taking a life of their own…The war on waste has begun in earnest…There are so many facets and ways you can reduce your waste and your carbon footprint…

A very valid point was raised by Adele …Adele also has a lovely blog and writes very good horror stories which if you are like me love a good horror story so pop over and say hello…

Adele said…

Fantastic, Carol. I get so uplifted by reading the tips and posts people have sent you about their recycling. I have thought about the textile industry a lot and I received an email from a recycling group highlighting organic, recycled wool. The problem was; the wool was around £58 a ball. I wrote to her and asked why these things, not just the wool but the organic clothes too, were so expensive and how a mother of three or a single mother on benefits could afford these things. I didn’t get a reply which was disappointing. More swap shops are needed, I think, where old jumpers are used for their wool, or clothes cut into new shapes. xxx

That truly is the case many times over anything healthy, organic or designed to cut waste is generally expensive and many times unwarranted.

I was really pleasantly surprised a few days ago to read that the Canadian Government has issued NEW food guidelines… Stating that you should eat … A Healthy Balanced Diet … Be mindful of your eating habits… Make water your drink of choice… cook more often… have plenty of fruit and vegetables… enjoy your food… be aware of food marketing… limit foods which are high in sodium, saturated fat and sugar…It sounds like me talking…Does it not??

It covers in depth how clever marketing can tempt you…I am sure the food manufacturers probably don’t like this new version…Well about time we stood up to them and their marketing ploys and prove we aren’t all stupid and easily swayed… It also has recipes it is a great new move by the Canadian Government lets hope we can put pressure on our governments to follow …If they are then please let us all know what they do to help improve your health and wellness as a nation.

♦♦♦♦♦

Although I have previously stated I am not a vegetarian I eat meat-free meals and my aim is to increase the meat-free meals I eat in a week.

Annika said:

Carol, an interesting article and as a vegetarian since birth I’m smiling how my ‘oddness’ is now becoming the norm. Supposedly a quarter of the UK are vegans at the moment and I personally know many who used to eat a lot of meat but have totally changed. As for trees, I worked within the timber trade and know that in Scandinavia there are actually more trees than a hundred years ago (70% of the land mass in Sweden is forested). Alas, forests in many regions of the worlds are not treated so ethically and suffering terribly … as a consumer it is our responsibility to check where items are sourced and managed.

Annika is a writer and an avid book reader and reviewer please pop over and check her out

Fish is my favourite food but it is becoming increasingly difficult to source sustainable fish or avoid farmed fish and as you know pollution is my baby especially the ecosystem as without that we won’t exist…

It is pleasing to see how the younger generation is doing something and this article caught my eye and what these young people did was actually promoted at the World Trade Centre…How brilliant is that?

Have you heard of Pollution Popsicles??? Have a look it is an awesome project and designed to raise awareness as I am sure it is.

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What else is on my agenda? I have been puzzling how to get my meat/fish home without a plastic bag…Carrying glass containers as well as our own cup it could begin to be a mission. Thinking back over the years all meat and fish was wrapped in paper…What paper though as we need to think o the trees…

Foodservice providers often use butcher paper that has been coated with a fine layer of wax or oil to make the paper more resistant to leaks when wrapping moist foods. Waxed or oiled butcher paper cannot be recycled, but it can be composted. … Butcher paper with food residue also cannot be recycled but can be composted.

It got me thinking can you buy recycled butchers paper?? Apparently yes you can…Amazon does and there are other companies who also sell recycled food wrapping. I just need to find one which deliveries here or I can buy here so that is my current mission…When I do I am sure I will be getting some very amused look at the market…haha

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Fruit Pulp…Leftover from your juicing…Do you use or throw it away?

Victoria Zigler sent me the link to an interesting article on using pulp leftovers…Thank you, Tori…

That’s all for this week I hope you have found something interesting and please carrying commenting I love to hear from you xxx

About Carol Taylor:

Enjoying life in The Land Of Smiles I am having so much fun researching, finding new, authentic recipes both Thai and International to share with you. New recipes gleaned from those who I have met on my travels or are just passing through and stopped for a while. I hope you enjoy them.

I love shopping at the local markets, finding fresh, natural ingredients, new strange fruits and vegetable ones I have never seen or cooked with. I am generally the only European person and attract much attention and I love to try what I am offered and when I smile and say Aroy or Saab as it is here in the north I am met with much smiling.

Some of my recipes may not be in line with traditional ingredients and methods of cooking but are recipes I know and have become to love and maybe if you dare to try you will too. You will always get more than just a recipe from me as I love to research and find out what other properties the ingredients I use contain to improve our health and wellbeing.

Exciting for me hence the title of my blog, Retired No One Told Me! I am having a wonderful ride and don’t want to get off, so if you wish to follow me on my adventures, then welcome! I hope you enjoy the ride also and if it encourages you to take a step into the unknown or untried, you know you want to…….Then, I will be happy!